Timescape
by Ailo296
Summary: <html><head></head>When Dipper goes off alone looking for his hat, he discovers a strange device with even stranger powers. What will this bring to him and the rest of Gravity Falls? Rated K. Takes place before The Time Traveler's Pig.</html>
1. In the Beginning

**_Monolouge_**

_It all started with the hat._

_I never thought my hat could have possibly gotten me into this much trouble, but now I'm scrambling through a place that is basically anywhere and everywhere at any moment in time. But let's start from the beginning. At least, I think this is the beginning. It's hard to tell from where I am right now..._

"Grappling Hook!" Mabel squealed. She fired the hook for the 5th time that day, almost sending our table lamp flying out the window.

"No!" I managed to grab it, but the window was too late to be saved. A piece of the shattered glass cut my arm as I pulled it back in.

Mabel was jumping on her bed, hopped up on raw sugar packets as usual. When she saw the cut on my arm, which I had not noticed, she stopped.

"You okay?" She asked me.

"Huh?" I examined my arm. "Oh. Yeah, I'll be fine."

All of a sudden, a strong gust of wind blew from behind me. I fell forwards, watching as the gust blew my hat out of the window. Mabel helped me up.

"Dipper, are you sure you're alright?" She said, looking into my eyes with her slightly creepy twin-stare.

"Yeah, I'll be fine." Somehow, I wasn't sure. Perhaps it was just the paranoia talking, but I had been facing the broken window when the gust of wind hit me, so where had it come from? Then, I remembered. My hat was in peril. I had to find it.

"I'm gonna go get my hat, don't break anything while I'm gone!" I said while sliding on my vest, tucking the journal into its special pocket and walking out the front door of the shack.

Upon getting outside, I began to search for my missing hat. Frankly, I had no idea why I cared so much about it. I just felt so incomplete without a hat on my head. The hat was nowhere around the Mystery Shack. All of a sudden, a shadow appeared above my head. I managed to dive out of the way as a large, red S hit the dirt where I had been standing. Not again! That was the 2nd time this week that the letter had fallen off of the building. I sighed with disgust. No way was I going to allow Grunkle Stan to make me nail it back on.

Continuing my search, I noticed that I had wandered into the forest. After looking around in the dark for about 10 minutes, I finally saw the hat at the top of the tree, its blue pine tree painted vividly in the light of the afternoon. I began to climb the tree. Unfortunately, my lack of athletic prowess was not serving me well. I slipped about 10 times, but pulled myself back up and continued my trek to the top. Finally, I reached the top and seized my hat. Sadly, I made the mistake of using both hands to place it on my head. I fell down the tree screaming. Somehow, I managed to get ahold of the trunk, but my foot slipped on a branch. It tilted downwards at an odd angle. By the time I realized what had happened, it was too late.

I watched in horror at what I had done by tripping on the branch-lever. The ground opened up beneath me, revealing a large, dark pit. Was it a bottomless pit? A black hole? I didn't want to know, but it seemed I had no choice as the tree went plunging inside with me on top of it.

I occasionally return to that day and listen to my screams. I didn't know how much worse it was going to get.


	2. The Orb of Wonders

**_Dipper's Monologue_**

_So yeah, that's how it began. However, it seems to prove nothing to you. You still have no idea where I am, what I'm doing, or anything I'm talking about. I'll get to that, just keep reading._

As the tree free-fell into the darkness, I didn't know what to expect. Was this another one of the author's mysteries?

The tree hit the ground. I slid down the trunk and landed on solid ground.

I was trapped in a dark surrounding with nothing **but** the tree to keep me company.

"Alright, **Maybe** the journal will have some answers to where I am." **I** pulled it out of my vest pocket, but it was too dark to read, so dark that I couldn't see my hands. I **had** left my flashlight at the shack, thinking that I would have found my hat quickly and walked back inside to eat my breakfast. Who would have thought that I would end up in **a** black pit in the middle of a forest with no way out? Gravity Falls was as puzzling as ever. There was no **chance** of that changing**...**

"Hello?" I called out. Like that would do anything. The pit was so deep, I couldn't even see the top. Perhaps there was an on-switch? I wandered around with my arms out to see if I could at least find a wall. When that didn't work, I attempted to return to the tree, but discovered that I couldn't find it. Just great. Now not only was I stuck here, I was also lost.

I panted, attempting to stay positive. There had to be some way to find out where I was. Hold on; I was standing on solid ground. What was the floor made out of? I got on my knees and felt the floor with my hands. It felt like glass. It was cold, smooth, yet hard. If it was glass, I could shatter it, right? Perhaps not with my hands, but with a spell. I recalled the journal having information about a spell that broke glass, but I hadn't memorized the incantation, and it was too dark to read. What was I going to do?

Convinced that my death was inevitable, I lay down on the supposed glass floor, arms and legs spread out, and sighed. I'd had a good life, right? If only I had actually managed to solve all of the mysteries of Gravity Falls. Now that I was trapped in one of them, I guess I could kiss that dream goodbye.

What happened next was completely dependent on me having that thought.

The lights came on. I sat up, startled, and surveyed my surroundings. I was in what appeared to be a green cube, but a very, very large green cube, big enough to fit about 9 Mystery Shacks in. No wonder I couldn't find the walls. The tree was in the middle of the room. I was about 2 yards away from it. But what attracted my attention the most was the thing in the wall.

There was a square hole in the middle of the wall in front of me. Inside it sat a small, strange looking black sphere just big enough to cover the front of my hand. I had seen no light switch when I looked around the room. Perhaps that was what turned the lights on? I stood up and walked towards it.

The sphere was connected to the wall by a series of wires. It was dented in one area, so I supposed that I couldn't technically call it a sphere. There was a bulb on the top and bottom of it, and a large screen on the front. Both of them glowed green. Gingerly, I tapped the sphere.

When I look back on it, _that _was the decision that got me into this mess.

The sphere popped out of the wall, floating in midair! It began moving around the room in a fashion that almost seemed frantic. It's screen began displaying the following words in crimson, robotic text:

"_Drvklpd, qr! Grq'w wrxfk wkdw, lw zloo gdpdjh pb lqqhu flufxlwub, sohdvh! Grq'w kxuw ph grq'w kxuw ph grq'w kxuw ph! Eohhs eodks eorrs eohks eoxks. L'p vruub, pdvwhu, exw L gr qrw eholhyh wkdw lw zdv pb idxow brxu ilqjhu zdv-" It paused to swivel around slowly. _It then turned its screen to me, the text on the screen turning yellow._ "Kxk?_"

I stared at the orb in confusion. Its behavior was strange, but almost... human-like. I decided to treat it as such and see what would happen.

"Umm, hello. I got lost down here, is there a way to get out? If so, please tell me! I need to leave, if that's okay." I figured that seemed human enough.

The orb stared me in the face. Switching its text to green, it began to spell more random letters.

"_Rk, khoor, kxpdq. Zhofrph wr pb Wlph Urrp. L vhh wkdw brx kdyh jrwwhq orvw khuh. Ihdu qrw, brxqj rqh. L zloo eulqj brx edfn wr brxu glphqvlrq. Eh vxuh qrw wr eolqn._"

I stared back with a puzzled look. "What?" Then I realized what it was doing.

"Wait! I recognize this! It's some sort of code!" I got on my knees, pulled out the journal and flipped to a page that I had bookmarked. The page was titled _Caesarian Shift._ I began to read.

"Ok, this says: 'All around the town of Gravity Falls, I have made coded notes to myself in order to remember things without allowing creatures to follow me. Translating these codes are simple. Simply look at the letter and replace it with a letter that is three steps back in the alphabet.' Seems simple enough." I flipped to a blank page in the journal, pulled a pen out of my vest pocket, and began translating the text.

I was halfway through when the orb suddenly turned its back to me. "Hey, wait, turn around!" But then I saw it. There was a dial on the back of the orb with three sections. One read "English", another read "Fdhvduldq", and the third read "Zgyzhs". The arrow on the dial was pointing to "Fdhvduldq". I facepalmed. Why didn't I see that? I reached for the dial and turned it counter clockwise one notch so that it pointed to "English".

The orb spun back around and recited its text in English, however this time, it came with a voice over. Unfortunately for me, the voice over was very distorted. It was to the point where I couldn't tell if the voice was male or female. Instead, I read the text on the screen.

"_Oh, hello, human. Welcome to my Time Room. I see that you have gotten lost here. Fear not, young one. I will bring you back to your dimension. Be sure not to blink._"

My eyes widened. "Hold on, what?"

The orb spun around once and glowed with a white light. The one part of my brain that wasn't engulfed in panic and confusion remembered the orb's instructions. I shielded my eyes, but I didn't close them.

When the light cleared, I slowly brought my hands away from my face, blinked twice, then looked around.

I was standing back in the Gravity Falls forest. My hat wasn't on my head. No way. It couldn't be, could it? I looked up. Sure enough, there was my hate, at the very top of the tree.

A sphere whizzed by and grabbed it. It floated back down, coming to a rest when it was at eye level with me. The hat was on its head.

"_For you, human._" I could feel a softness in its distorted voice. I gently took the hat off of the orb and put it on my head.

"Thanks. I owe you one. Although, would you mind telling me what exactly happened in there?"

_"Not at all. You landed in my secret room. I have been trapped there for..." _Its voice trailed off.

"For how long?" I asked it.

The orb looked at me. _"I...I'm not sure. It's hard to tell."_

"Why's that?"

_"You see, I am a machine that was built to travel through time. I have done it many, many times. Once I do it, I feel the essence of time slowly slip away. I am never sure where I am in the space-time continuum or how long I have been there. For all I know, I could have been down there for half an hour..." _It paused. "_Or 12 centuries."_

"Wow. That's deep."

_"Yes. Very deep."_

I looked around. "Wait, so when I ended up here, my hat was in the tree. So that means... I traveled through time!"

(Random Author's Note: Please keep in mind that this story takes place before _The Time Traveler's Pig.)_

"_Yes. I sent you back in time to before you were sent to my dimension."_

"Awesome!" I said.

_"Yes, I used to love traveling through time as well."_

My smile faded. I had not considered what the orb felt like. My transporting me back, it had slipped another inch with its grip on the flow of time.

The orb noticed this. _"Do not feel bad, human. It was to save you from being trapped in my dimension forever."_

"Yeah, I know. But you seem to hate that place a lot, so why don't you just leave?"

_"I cannot. It is my prison. I was locked in there to seal away my powers."_

"Locked in? By who?"

_"I don't know. It is hard to tell with all of the space-time distortion that I feel."_

That was an obvious lie, but I could tell that the orb regarded it as a painful memory, so I decided not to pursue the topic any further.

"But how are you locked in there? You're out here now."

_"I was not sure why I was able to do this at first, but now I understand. You and I together are to much for the prison to hold. That is why we could both cross through. However, my console is in the room. I am connected to it, and I cannot leave it very far behind. So in a way, I am still forced to stay in my dimension because a part of me still exists there."_

I felt sorry for the orb, which was strange, because it was a machine. But it had emotions and feelings of sadness. I regarded it to be a living thing. Besides, it was pretty cool.

"My name's Dipper. I would shake hands with you, but it appears you don't have any."

The orb made a static-y sound that sounded a lot like a laugh. "_My name in Caesarian script is Wlphvfdsh, which translates to... Timescape."_

I smiled a bit. "Timescape. That's a very original name. Although, it kinda sounds like the one thing you don't want to do; escape from time."

The orb made the laughing sound again. "_You are very funny, Dipper. I think we can be good friends."_

"Sure." I said. "I'll come visit you every so often."

"_I would like that." _Timescape replied.

"Well, see ya." I turned around and took off towards the shack. Upon entering, I was greeted by an always bubbly and over-eccentric Mabel.

"You found your hat! Now come and get something to eat." She grabbed me by the arm and hauled me off to the kitchen.


	3. A Glimpse at Things to Come

**Dipper's Monologue**

_So yeah, that's how I met Timescape, one of my first friends in Gravity Falls. Anyways, on with the story._

The whole day, I was thinking about Timescape. Maybe I could ask him if he minded having his picture taken. Then I could show it to Grunkle Stan and he would have to believe me. That felt like it was worth a shot. I also couldn't get over the fact that I had actually traveled through time. It was just purely incredible. Still, I was willing to bet that Timescape had sent other people back and forth in time, so I was quite certain that I wasn't the _1st _human to travel through time. Still, it was pretty cool.

Either way, I intended to keep my promise to my new friend, so I went to visit him the next day. After scarfing down the disgusting cereal flakes that Stan had most likely gotten at the cheapest store in town, I walked out the door and into the forest. Upon walking to the spot where I had met Timescape, I took out my journal and began to read while I walked. I had read through the whole thing multiple times, but there was no mention of Timescape. This was the first time since arriving at Gravity Falls that I was unable to find an unusual occurrence in the journal. Following the winding river, I continued to read. All of a sudden, I felt my foot press against something. I tripped over a log, the journal tumbling out of my hands.

"No!" I tried to reach for it, but my arms were too short.

All I could do was watch in horror as it fell into the river.

Panting heavily, I remained sprawled on the ground in shock. No. It couldn't just be gone. That journal was the key to unlocking the mysteries of Gravity Falls. And now it was gone. All because I was reckless and not looking where I was going. What had I done?

Putting the thoughts aside, I decided to go after it. But before I could jump into the river, I heard a distorted, yet familiar voice behind me.

"_Missing Something?_"

I whipped around to find Timescape with the journal sitting on top of its head. The orb leaned forward and deposited the book in my hands.

"Timescape?" I felt the journal. It was completely dry. "How did you-" Then I realized. Timescape must have gone back in time to right before I had dropped the journal and grabbed it before it could go for an unplanned swim.

"You shouldn't have done that. Now your grip on time or whatever will be further away."

Timescape responded with the following emoticon face:

:)

How could a machine that was most likely built in the 1900s know anything about that? Well, after I thought about it, Timescape most likely time traveled to this era, so it probably knew all about the stuff we had here.

Anyways, Timescape smiled. "_You do know that it doesn't really matter much to me, right?_"

"Really?"

_"Yeah. Frankly, it was more of an abstract concept to begin with. It doesn't harm me or make me change in any way."_

"Oh. Hang on, I forgot to say thank you. You got my journal back! That's awesome!"

Timescape smiled again. _"Aww, it was nothing. By the way, what is that book? Why do you like it so much?"_

I held up the journal. "This holds knowledge of all of the strange occurrences that go on in Gravity Falls."

"_What strange stuff?"_

I looked at Timescape. "You know, all this stuff." I proceeded to flip to pages that I had bookmarked and gave the orb a brief explanation of each of them.

"_Yes, I know." _ the orb said. "_But why are those things... strange?_"

Now I was confused. "Well, because they're things that you don't normally see."

"_What do you mean? I used to see them all the time. They aren't strange occurrences."_

I stopped. Timescape had just given me a revelation.

If Gravity Falls had all of these strange things, most of which that lived in the forest, then Timescape must have seen them all. He probably rarely left this forest, and most likely never left Gravity Falls. The stuff that I considered strange was a norm to him.

"You know what? Forget that." I put the journal away. "What do you want to do?"

"_I don't have anything planned. Wanna do some time traveling?" _

"Would I ever!"

With that note, Timescape began to glow with a white light again. I didn't blink, just like last time. When it cleared, I was in a place I didn't recognize. It looked as if I was underground in some sort of mine shaft. Large, golden bubbles hung from the walls and ceilings. I could see something silhouetted against them, as if a very large creature was inside.

"Where are we?" I asked the orb.

"_This is something you will have to deal with in the future." _Timescape replied.

"What? You're spoiling my future for me? What's the deal, man?"

Timescape laughed. _"Sorry, I thought you wouldn't mind just one. We can go back if you want."_

I sighed. "It's ok. Can we go back now? I'm not mad, Actually I'm kinds of interested of how this adventure of mine will play out. But it wasn't meant to happen yet."

"_Alright, here goes."_ Timescape did his magical-glowing-lights-thing, and there we were back in the forest.

"Well, that was fun. Where to next?" I sighed. Hanging around with Timescape would never get old.

Timescape glowed with a bright light, and we were off again.


	4. Mabel's Concerns

Dipper's Monologue

**I haven't really got much to say. Go ahead and read the story.**

* * *

><p>In my travels with Timescape that day, he took me to the ancient days of Gravity Falls, where life was still in the Cenozoic period, and many more places, essentially showing me the history of the town. I was finding this very useful in my investigations of how the town became the paranormal place that it was in the present day. It seemed to go on for hours, but of course, Timescape would just bring us back to about an hour before we had left. Sometimes I wondered what my folks did whenever I was adventuring around with Timescape. I doubted they missed me. After my latest adventures through time, I thanked Timescape and ran back up to the front door.<p>

* * *

><p>Hey, it's me, Mabel.<p>

Ever since a few days ago, Dipper started leaving the house for an hour and coming back, not explaining to any of us where he was going or what he was doing. In the beginning, I just ignored it, but eventually I became concerned. I mean, I had seen the crazy things in Gravity Falls. Most of them didn't scare me, but Dipper was the opposite. Whatever he was up to could end up becoming a problem for both of us.

So, when he got home for the 5th time, I decided to ask him a few things.

Dipper opened the door and began to walk upstairs. I stopped him.

"Hold on, there, Dipster." I said. "You've got some explaining to do."

"About what?" He replied blankly, raising an eyebrow.

"I think you know. Where have you been running off to all the time? Grunkle Stan might not care, but I do."

"I don't have to tell you anything, Mabel." He said, pushing past me and walking up the rickety steps to our room.

I walked up after him. "Don't go ignoring me like that, just tell me what you're doing! I won't say anything."

"Sorry, I can't." He walked upstairs and closed the door behind me.

I sighed. I guess I wasn't getting anywhere by talking to him.

* * *

><p>Dipper here.<p>

Upon entering my room, I sighed. Expecting Mabel to follow me inside, I stood against the door for a few minutes, but left after it was apparent that she had no intention of doing so. I lay on my bed. Timescape had not specifically told me to be secretive about his existence, but I was afraid that if I told anyone, something would happen to the space-time continuum. Ok, I'll admit that I might have been a bit paranoid. Still, that's nothing to be ashamed of.

Seeing that the journal had no information on anything Timescape-related, I had basically given up on trying to find an explanation for his existence. Besides, I would rather enjoy the company of my new friend than bother him with probing questions about himself. That's just basic human sociability.

Still, I found Timescape's existence agitating. It's like he wasn't _meant _to exist. Something about him was just off. Yeah, something other than the fact that he's a time-traveling mechanical orb with functioning emotions. It just didn't make sense.

_"You know what? Forget it."_ I thought to myself. There was no point in wondering about his existence. If I kept doing it, I might end up losing one of the best friends I'd had upon coming to this town. I took off my hat, set it on my night stand, and switched off the light, curling up to go to sleep.

I was too tired by the time I realized that I had gone to sleep at 4:30.


End file.
